I just checked. My road bike has 2250 miles on it. The chain has the barest visible stretch - at 12 inches, it is perhaps 1/64th of an inch of stretch, just barely enough to notice.

I ride it in the wet, but not on gravel. I think that makes a huge difference. I doubt water makes any difference to speak of.

.02: changing from a bushingless Derailleur chain on an IGH bike

to an older style Full bushing chain on the same bike has made a difference

In how long the chain wears. or so It Seems ..

How often did you lube it up and how often did you thoroughly clean everything? I never rode in gravel, either, and lubed every couple hundred miles or after a wet ride. But I didn't do so well with the cleaning and now my chain has a ton of stretch at 2,350 miles.

My SS commuter did a bit over 1000 miles to a chain using SRAM SG-1 chains on frequently wet, sandy but paved MUPs. I typically replaced at 0.75 wear, which was when I started to get occasional 'popping' under heavy load. I broke a link once on a 1.0-ish worn chain when it popped under heavy load, and don't wish to experience that again.

My road bike's chain lasts significantly longer, though I still replace at 0.75 wear.

That's my best explanation. Perhaps if I had done the full mineral spirits/ultrasonic cleaner/Chain-L voodoo dance with that 830 that I currently do, it might have lasted longer, but 850s cost so little extra that I have no reason to try my luck with another 830. :)

I intended to clean and lube every weekend, but in reality I probably averaged every 2 or 3 weekends, which is about 200 to 25 miles on average.

Maybe you're a lot stronger than I am and are just destroying your drivetrain out of distilled awesome power :)

FWIW this is the chain that came on a BikesDirect Windsor Fens, and I cleaned it on bike with a Finish Line cleaner and I used ProLink for the first half or so, and switched to Chain-L in August.

As an aside, man, Chain-L is like tar in cold weather. It's like putting molasses on the chain, it just sits on top for a long time.

My thoughts exactly, I would only put 830 chains on bikes that I knew were rarely ridden, anybody who actually rode their bike automatically got an 850 chain when I was in a retail shop.

I guess "Itsjustme" should get ready for a lot of chain-stretch over the next 100 miles!! :lol: Or there are a lot of variables at play: I think the 'amount of road-grime encountered' and 'frequency of cleaning' are huge variables that are not tracked as easily as miles.